Conducting convergence innovation

Creative Sparks was launched at MaRS on Wednesday, May 7, as a component of the Esprit Orchestra’s 2008 season and the New Wave Composers Festival. It was conceived by Esprit’s Music Director and Conductor, Alex Pauk, and it was an exemplary model of the themes that MaRS embraces: convergence, innovation, creativity and collaboration.

The project brought professional composers together with Toronto Area high school and middle school students to mentor the burgeoning compositional and performance talents. The idea was to stretch the boundaries between the students’ understanding of what orchestral music is and what it can become. Students were encouraged to consider the traditional sound of an orchestra being enhanced by technology, amplified sounds that would not usually be part of a score and MaRS as the performance platform.

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New Radicals Button

On Tuesday, April 15th, a multitude of people came together at the Gardiner Museum of Ceramics in celebration of the touted tome entitled “We are The New Radicals: A Manifesto for Reinventing Yourself and Saving the World.” The author, Julia Moulden, a five-foot-something dynamo exhibited an energy for this idea as vibrant as the red lipstick she sports.

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Donning a new hat to get stuff done

After exercising your creativity muscles during Idea Week and Creativity & Innovation Day last week (as I’m sure you all were!), it’s now time to put those fantastic ideas into action.

But how do you change gears from creativity ringleader and innovation cheerleader to schedule whip-cracker so that big ideas don’t flounder in the ether?

Scott Berkun spoke yesterday at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco and told us “How to innovate on time.”

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Creativity and Innovation Day: April 21st

A Canadian-born project, started to celebrate creativity and explore how it can impact and promote innovation, is now an annual event. Today, April 15, Leonardo Da Vinci’s birthday, is when the party begins. Idea Week is seven days that are set aside to encourage creativity and enthusiasm for innovation in the arts, business, science and education sectors. It’s all concluded with Creativity and Innovation Day on April 21.

Da Vinci took different approaches to solving problems and working with ideas. He is, if you will, the mascot and hero of Creativity and Innovation Day.

Why celebrate? Find new solutions to old problems, create new opportunities, breakdown barriers and open new choices.

Want to know what can you do to celebrate the day?

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One of the biggest challenges faced by non-profit and charitable organizations is finding volunteers to help them to do the work to achieve their goals. Recognizing this, many non-profit organizations have shifted a significant portion of their time and effort to develop strategies to recruit, retain and motivate volunteers versus the traditional focus of trying to figure out ways to get more funding. The quest is challenging and few organizations can legitimately claim they have a proven mechanism to engage and retain volunteers. Well, except for one: the Framework Foundation, an organization that spurs volunteerism — not for itself, but for the benefit of other organizations — might just have the perfect solution.

Anil Patel, the Executive Director of the Framework Foundation, has created an innovative program called the Timeraiser. This annual event has proven wildly successful in encouraging people to donate their time to worthy volunteer opportunities. If you are skeptical, read on, but also check it out for yourself as the event will be held in Toronto’s famed Distillery District Fermenting Cellar on Saturday, April 5th, 2008. Doors open at 7pm.

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In Praise of Slow

Did you know that today, February 25, 2008, is the second annual Worldwide Day of Slow Living? If that’s news to you, let’s slow down for a minute and talk about the growing international slow movement.

Carl Honoré, a Canadian journalist based in London, was in Toronto recently to speak about the slow movement at the Ontario Library Association conference.

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DNA art: the perfect Vday gift for science nerds

Whenever I see something that stimulates both the left and right sides of my brain simultaneously, I can’t help but get excited. Ottawa-based DNA 11 is where art and science converge to bring custom portraits of your DNA fingerprint to your living room. It’s the perfect Valentine’s Day gift for the science nerd in your life!

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